"His furniture, probably."
"You ever see him here otherwise?"
"No. Nobody comes down here, except for deliveries. Unless there's something wrong with the plant."
"Hmph. Better go talk to St. Paul," Lucas said.
"What'd St. Paul say?" Del asked.
"First they said it was all bullshit, it didn't make any difference. There was no indication that there was anyone else in the building. Then they started pissing on each other," Lucas said.
"Over here, we'd be shooting at each other."
"That's a kinder, gentler city," Lucas said. They were walking across town, Lucas with a large-sized manila envelope in one gloved hand. The day was even colder than it had been early in the week, and though the sky had turned blue, a gusty wind was cutting along the streets. Shoppers were bundled in long coats, and businessmen snarled into the wind.
"If you don't tell me what's in the envelope, I'm gonna be pretty embarrassed when we get there," Del said.
"Pretend like you knew all along."
"You're just bustin' my balls because you got up crabby."
"Nope. I'm actually pretty cheerful," Lucas said.
"And that surprises me," Del said. "I figure you've either solved the case or you're fuckin' Jael Corbeau."
"Why couldn't it be both?" Lucas asked cheerfully.
"Nobody's that's lucky," Del said. "So what's in the envelope?"
"Let India tell you," Lucas said. "When we get to Browns."
India, Philip the manager, and the other woman who'd looked at Rodriguez's picture were waiting at the desk when Lucas and Del arrived at Browns Hotel. Lucas slipped a photograph out of the envelope and passed it across; the photograph had been taken that morning with a digital camera, and had been printed out only a half hour earlier. "Do you know this guy?"
Del tried to edge sideways to get a look, but Lucas cheerfully blocked him off.
"That's him," India said. The other woman nodded, and Philip, looking down his nose at the photo, said, "Yes, I've seen him."
"Did he know Derrick Deal?"
"He may have," Philip said. "He probably did. I think I saw the three of them talking once. At least once. So maybe"
"He was definitely around here," India said.
Del reached out, took the picture, glanced at it, and said, "It's like I been telling you since the start, Lucas. It's that fuckin' Spooner."
"You've got to be kidding," Rose Marie Roux said. She was leaning back as far as she could in her office chair, hands covering her eyes as if to block out the horror of it all. "We've already started taking credit on Rodriguez."
"He was murdered," Lucas said. "It kept me up half the night, thinking about it. And remember how we decided that if Angela Harris could make an accurate prediction about the murders of the Olsons, then we'd have to pay close attention?"
"I remember."
"So I was awake half the night, working this out. And when I got done, I madetwo predictions. First, that I'd find a way the killer could have gotten out of Rodriguez's building. And second, that the people at Brown's would recognize Spooner. I'm also making a third prediction. We know we only got about half the people at the partyFrank's got his people running pictures of Spooner around to the party people we interviewed. I'm predicting that somebody will put him at the party."
"Ah, mother. Run it down for me," Rose Marie said.
Lucas ticked the points off:
"We had a guy who came out of the slums of Detroit with no educationand two years later, is setting up a Miami corporation to buy legitimate apartments which he uses to wash his drug money. That's a little too sophisticated.
"If it's too sophisticated, where did he figure out how to do it? How about a banker?
"What does the banker get out of it? How about dope, money, and women?
"What does Rodriguez get? How about financing, a way to wash his dope money, and legitimacy. He was asmart guy, even if he didn't have much education.
"What happens at the party? Who knows? But Spooner winds up killing Sandy Lansing, maybe accidentally. Alie'e witnesses the killing, so he has to kill her. He then evaporatesmaybe goes out the window, I don't know. In any case, he doesn't come up on our party list. He's not part of that crowd, he's just Lansing's boyfriend, and lot of people don't even knowher."
"Wait a minute," Rose Marie said. "There's a fairly big jump in there. All the other stuff is linked, but that's a pure jump"
"Let me finish," Lucas said.
"We identify Rodriguez as being at that party, because, unlike Spooner, he's known to be rich and single, and so he gets some attention from the other partygoers.
"When Al-Balah links Rodriguez and Lansing, weassume that since they were dealer-employee, that there'd been a falling-out. We thenassume that Derek Deal knew about them, because we knew Rodriguez was Lansings boss. We assume that Deal went to Rodriguez, tried to blackmail him, and got killed for his trouble. But when I took a photo of Rodriguez over to Brown's, nobody recognized him. And I remembered that, back when I first talked to Deal, he wasn't absolutely sure that Sandy Lansing was a dealer. Hethought she might be, but he didn'tknow . And that suggests to me that he didn't know who her boss was. He definitely knew who her boyfriend waswe confirmed that today, with the photo of Spooner. He went toSpooner, not Rodriguez, and he got killed.
"Of all the people who were at the party, the ones most likely to finger Spooner as being there were Lansing, who was dead, and Rodriguez, who couldn't, because that would drag the whole drug-apartment deal out into the open.
"So then I talk to Spooner. I try to intimidate him by suggesting that we're about to bust Rodriguez, and let him know that we're watching Rodriguez, that we're all over him.
"Spooner realizes that if wereally come down on Rodriguez, his goose is cookedRodriguez will try to stay clean as long as he can, but he's not gonna suck it up for first-degree murder. He'll talk to us, and one thing that will come out is that Spooner was at the party. And Spooner had some kind of relationship with Lansing. Sex, dope, something. He'd be as good a suspect as Rodriguez. But if Rodriguez commits suicide"
"Spooner knows we're watching Rodriguez, and probably suspects that includes tapping the phone. So he goes to Rodriguez's apartment and slips a note under the door.
Probably something unsigned, maybe even typed. It says something like, 'They're coming for youyou gotta get anything incriminating off your computer. Burn this note.' "
"And we find ashes in the sink at Rodriguez's apartment," Del said. "Though he could of flushed it."
"Nothing gets rid of paper like burning," Lucas said. He continued:
"So Spooner watches Rodriguez until he sees him leave for home, then hides out in the building where he can watch the entrance from the ramp. Rodriguez goes home, gets the note, thinks, 'Oh, man, if they get the computer, my goose is cooked.' He stops at CompUSA to get a Zip disk, because he plans to dump his files to the Zip disk, then either write over the hard drive or just take it out and throw it in the river. They're cheap enough.
"Spooner knows we're watching, so he can't just whack Rodriguez and walk out the Skyway or the ramp or the front door, which would be the logical way to get out, especially if you're in a little bit of a hurry. He has to sneak out. The basement door."
"How'd he know about that?" Del asked.
"Who knows? Maybe from hanging around with Rodriguez. Maybe he actually scouted the building the day before. Whatever the reason, if Rodriguez was murdered, the killersnuck out, as though he knew the place were being watched."
"How'd he kill him?" Rose Marie asked.
"Hit him with something flat and hard. Not a baseball bat, because the wound would be wrong. Maybe a two-by-four."
"Oooh. Sting the hands," Del said.
"He then hauls Rodriguez over to the railing, hangs him over, head down, and lets go. Rodriguez hits headfirst and he's gone," Lucas said.